Google drops + as a search option

I don't know if anyone else has seen this, but it looks as though Google has done away with the '+' symbol in search.

I checked in their search help pages as well and it's confirmed with: "The + operator has been replaced. To search for an exact word or phrase, use double quotation marks." This is disappointing, as the + sign was fairly general across search engines as a way of forcing the engine into using a specific variation of a word or phrase. It also means that it's now necessary to type another character - which is a petty point I know, but they all count. To be honest, I'm not that surprised - what with Google+ and +1 buttons and the like, they'd got themselves into a right pickle with the symbol. It has made it almost impossible to see if this is an entirely new thing, or it's been around for a while, but my feeling is that it's new, as I run +searches quite often. (Having just checked, this seems to be new, less than 24 hours old).

Comments

[Ted W]

Google's statement that since "The + operator has been replaced", "To search for an exact word or phrase, use double quotation marks" is not even relevant and helps not at all! The purpose of '+' in search syntax has nothing to do with a "search for an exact word or phrase". Rather, ' +' assures that the hits will have the words somewhere but not necessarily together. If I replace [ word1 +word2 ] with [ "word1 word2" ] I'll only get "word1 word2" and never anything like "word1 comes before word2" or even "word2 word1". Google's statement about a substitute for the ' +' operator is bewildering.

[Ben M. Schorr]

Does it really matter though? If you search for Word1 Word2 without the quotes won't you get sites that include both words, not necessarily together?

[Phil Bradley]

Ben - it matters for a huge number of reasons. Firstly, it's doubling the keystrokes, which if you use it a lot is a pain.
Second, they introduced it with virtually no notice, it kinda just slipped in. That's not courteous.
Third, it's going against the convention that all other search engines use, which adds to the problems of trainers.
Fourthly, it's indicative of the fact that they're going to be wanting to do something with it in the future - and I don't think it's a co-incidence that we've got the +1 button and Google+ either.

[Norma]

I really appreciate your ideas and information you mentioned here. I also agree, and your common sense facts and information collected. Thank you for having here.

[Frogger]

I can see what you're saying but I find that SEO and Internet Marketing is like that. Things change all the time and it's pointless to worry about the changes or even why they happened... The best thing to do is accept the changes and find a way around them.

I find Google doesn't really care what the "little" guys think. They do what they want when they want. Unfortunately, when you have the biggest market share you can almost do what you want.